To have a job is a right, not a privilege

Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

Everyone, without any discrimination, has the right to equal pay for equal work.

Everyone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity, and supplemented, if necessary, by other means of social protection.

Everyone has the right to form and to join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

71 years since the adaptation of UDHR by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris (1948), we are witnessing ignorance and contempt toward this magnificent human rights bill but most of all by the governments who have signed and pledged to it.

Why?:

In a class society, like capitalism, a minority that have usurped the means of production, decide on the conditions and terms of a single or collective job, according to their interests. They decide or are forced to decide by their acquisitive competitions, who and how many people have to work, or have to wait in the long line of unemployed citizens.

For instance, if you add the current number of Americans without a job (9.75 million) to the number of US citizens not participating in labor market (92.02 m.), you come up with 101.77 million working age Americans who do not have work, according to data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), May 2014.

In another report, the real unemployment (those who are looking for a job) rate’s triple official figure- 13.3% vs 4.3%, (nationaleconomicseditorial.com), June 26, 2017.

Therefore, their right to work, their free choice of employment, and their protection against unemployment are crushed under the heels of the capitalist system voracity. Thus, for those who are able to sell their labour, having a job becomes a privilege, not a human right.

Jobs become scarce because they are exported to low-wage countries for more profits. Divisiveness against women, races, nationalities, and minorities is encouraged to carry on pay discrimination for the purpose of even more profits.

With the ever-growing sectors of science and technology inevitably resulting in the automation of industries, benefit employers in the expense of employee poverty. Machines take the place of workers and working people, giving rise to under-employment, unemployment, and totally jobless people in society.

As a result of mergers, or appropriation of smaller corporations by bigger ones, similar positions are eliminated and extra work forces are laid-off.

Neo-Liberal policy of privatization of the states’ companies which follows by austerity measures and cuts, will lead to even more unemployment. The same policy that includes deregulations incur job insecurity and annihilate job guaranty. As a result, the prospect specially for young people seeking a lasting job, and forming a normal and hopeful life is doomed. Constant fear for the future always exists. “There can be nothing happy for the person over whom some fear always looms”, (Roman Orator Cicero).

As the capital grows faster and faster and takes over all branches of government, suppression of civil liberties is pursued. The right to form and join trade unions are discouraged.

Fifty years ego, nearly a third of US workers belonged to a union. Today it is one in 10, (Planet Money: NPR, February 23, 2015)

Imposing overtime, work up to 12 or 16 hours a day without payment, gradually becomes a norm in the workplaces. This ill-being along with the fear of being fired, will have enormous damage and psychological impact on individuals, families and the whole society. Slavish competition between individuals, leads to famous capitalism’s individualism, persuading self-interests, and the indifference to others’ suffering. In the worst-case scenario we will be witnessing suicidal tendencies, and even mass shooting attacks within the work place.

It is the time to acknowledge that more advanced capitalism brings about more suppression and misery to the people. Richer and more powerful bosses are crueler to their servants.

Work is an essential and pleasant part of life for every living thing, to grow, and breed. But in the human class society, it becomes a tool for exploitation and misery driven by greed.